Then he backed up and rode in a circle to where he was about twenty feet away from the entrance to the path but had his mount pointed straight at it.
“What is he doing, Pansy?”
Then she found out. He rushed towards the path in a charge that would make any cavalry regiment proud, crashing through the vegetation straight towards her. As he reached her he reined his horse to a sudden halt.
“Imagine meeting you here, Lady Sibbridge.”
Before she could rein herself in she found herself saying: “I’m not Lady Sibbridge. My mother is Lady Sibbridge. My father is Lord Sibbridge. My name is Amy.”
Ben was a little surprised that she had just surrendered her formality.
“I’ll make a deal with you. I will call you Amy if you call me Ben.”
Before she could answer he coaxed his horse in the direction of the River Arne. She followed slowly. She and Pansy came alongside him as he looked intently at the river.
“I’ve always loved the sound of a river. I used to come here with my father when I was young. He was very much involved in trade and we only occasionally came to Hillfield House. That is likely when you were very small. Maybe it was before you were born. Then my father went to India and left me with my uncle.”
Amy had been studying Ben while he was talking. She felt she had seen him someplace.
“Have we ever met? I feel as if I’ve seen you somewhere.”
“Yes. We met last night at Brewminster Hall.”
“I don’t mean that! Had we ever met before then?”
“I probably just look familiar because I’m Everyman. Just as the old morality plays says: My name is Everyman.”
“If I saw you in London or Bath that might be a possibility. Mother has only taken me to gatherings in London for the last two years.”
“Well I never go to gatherings in either place if I can avoid them. I only went to the Brewminster’s last night in order to be a good neighbor.”
“I had to read Everyman and I don’t remember these words.” said Amy as her thoughts drifted back to his comment.
“You do know that you seem to have the tendency to resurrect parts of discussions that are already past?”
“Let’s look at the old mill,” said Amy intentionally changing the subject.
“The river might be too deep to cross.” Ben was clearly reluctant to cross over to the mill.
“No it isn’t,” said Amy. “I can see the bottom from here.”
“I’m not so sure,” said Ben with a grin she didn’t see, “sometimes water can look shallower than it really is.”
“I can assure you that the river is not too deep.” She shuddered as her recent experience at plumbing its depth came back to mind.
“I don’t think we should,” said Ben. “The owner might not like it.”
“Aren’t you the owner?”
“I don’t know. I think my property ends at the river. I’ll have to ask my uncle. My uncle and my father practically grew up here, but as I said I’ve only been here a few times when I was small and my father never brought me down here.”
“Well, whoever owns it I’m sure he wouldn’t care.” She nudged Pansy forward, but Ben reached out and caught her reins.
“I’d much prefer if we didn’t. I don’t like to trespass on someone else’s land.”
Ben’s reluctance didn’t make much sense to Amy, but she went ahead and changed the subject as she turned Pansy around and headed back through the trees and bushes to the road.
“I’ve never seen Hillfield House except from the distance.” Which was not entirely accurate. “Perhaps you will do me the courtesy of allowing me to visit sometime,” she asked coyly.
“You may visit me anytime if you bring a chaperone.”
Amy was annoyed at his implication she might do otherwise. She nudged Pansy into a gallop in the direction of home.
Chapter 5
When they reached her home, Ben escorted her into the house where her mother almost collided with them when she emerged suddenly from the drawing room looking quite distracted.
“Oh dear, oh dear,” Lady Sibbridge muttered quite flustered.
“Mother, Sir Benjamin is here.”
Looking around in several directions at once, something only she could do, Lady Sibbridge said with only a glance, “Good morning, Sir Benjamin. Oh dear.”
“What’s the matter, Mother,” inquired Amy.
“Oh dear. I’m trying to arrange a picnic, and I can’t find my invitation cards. And I’ve lost Mrs. Parkhurst.”
“We’re going to have a picnic? Could we invite Sir Benjamin if he is willing to come?”
Amy knew if her mother was sending out invitations the picnic was for more than just the family.
“Would you like to come to our picnic, Sir Benjamin?” Amy invited.
“I would be honored,” he replied. “If I am not down in London. When is the picnic?”
Her mother had already wandered off muttering to herself.
“I know my mother and I am sure that as of this time she has no idea when she intends the picnic to take place.”
“Your mother was saying that she lost Mrs. Parkhurst?”
“Mrs. Charlotte Parkhurst is my sister Emma’s tutor. And I have no idea what Mother is talking about, although if anyone can lose someone it is my mother. Anyway, when Mother gets the invitations sent out, then we’ll know when the picnic will take place. I don’t know what else to say.”
“I will look forward to receiving an invitation.”
He smiled, giving Amy a quick bow and walking to the front door. As he reached it the door swung open and Emma entered carrying a hedgehog. Ben grimaced and looked at Amy.
“Emma! Take that poor hedgehog back where you found it. Its mother will be looking for it.”
Ben decided it was time to get away from the Sibbridge’s residence.
“I bid you ladies adieu,” he said slipping out the front door.
Amy looked over at the door to say goodbye but Ben was already gone.
“It’s fully grown. It’s mother will not be looking for it,” asserted Emma with a tone that suggested there was something deficient in Amy’s ability to judge the age of hedgehogs, and that Emma was disappointed in such a failure in her sister. However, in deference to her sister, Emma opened the front door in order to restore the hedgehog to its former abode.
“Wait a minute,” commanded Amy.
Emma paused in the doorway and looked at her sister apprehensively.
“Emma, why cannot mother find Mrs. Parkhurst?”
“How would I know that,” said Emma and Amy felt she detected a sheepish note in Emma’s response.
Then a thought occurred to Amy.
“Aren’t you supposed to be doing your lessons?”
“I... I suppose, but as you heard mother, we cannot find Mrs. Parkhurst.”
“Emma, where is Mrs. Parkhurst?”
Emma shrugged and said she didn’t know. But to Amy she looked guilty.
“Are you sure,” asked a highly suspicious Amy.
“How would I know,” asked Emma looking ever so innocent. “Am I her keeper?”
“The last person to say that was Cain and he’d just killed his brother. You didn’t just kill Mrs. Parkhurst, did you?”
“Not yet,” Emma mumbled darkly under her breath.”
Amy didn’t catch what her sister said.
“What did you just say?”
“Nothing,” said Emma and then ran outside slamming the front door behind her.
Amy considered a hot pursuit then decided she had better go and see how her mother was doing.
When Amy came downstairs after changing out of her riding habit, the family was sitting down to lunch. Before everyone was even seated, Mattie was already gushing about the gangly youth, and comparing Ben negatively to her skinny and almost certainly temporary object of affection.
Which reminded her mother of Ben.
“Sir Benjamin was just
here,” she said. “We should invite him to the picnic.”
Emma had just slipped into the room and she took her seat.
“Are we inviting Sir Frank and Lady Ramsey?” she asked her mother.
“Maybe we shouldn’t if you keep making these outlandish and unladylike comments.”
Amy wondered what Emma had said this time that her mother felt was unladylike. Of course, her mother regarded most everything that Emma said or did as unladylike. Emma and Lady Sibbridge looked at this world from two entirely different and incompatible points of view. Her mother almost immediately satisfied Amy’s curiosity.
“Lord and Lady Ramsey were leaving. They were in great haste to get back to London before dark. Dear Estella is so afraid of the highwaymen that have plagued the London Road and other highways of late. I don’t blame her one bit. These modern highwaymen aren’t like the ones when I was young. They are so violent today. They think nothing of assaulting their victims, even killing them. Quite unlike what they used to be. Once, when your father and I were young we were confronted by a highwayman on the Dover Road, and he was actually quite charming. He did take your father’s medallion... And he did take my necklace, but he apologized profusely.”
Amy glanced over at her father. He seemed to be shaking his head as if he didn’t quite agree, but she couldn’t be sure. There was no way of telling if he even understood what her mother was saying.
“Anyway,” her mother continued, “just as they were leaving, what did Emma blurt out but that she wanted a telescope and her father had consented to buying her one. Heaven knows that your dear father can be led to consent to anything right now, but if he was his old self I cannot believe he would ever consent to such a thing. It is unnatural for a girl to be interested in such things.”
Amy glanced over at Emma and feared her sister was on the point of an act of aggression, at least a vocal one, so she decided she better intervene.
“I was out riding and encountered Sir Benjamin. He seemed unsure if the old mill was on his property or not. Doesn’t his property extend over to the London Road?”
“I don’t know, dear,” Lady Sibbridge said in a rare moment of thoughtfulness. And then moving the boundary lines of the subject, “I remember his grandfather. And his father too. The boys used to live up here all the time until they went off to school. After school, Lord Caradoc, Sir Benjamin’s father, seldom came up here after he inherited the title and the estate. And I’ve never seen Sir Benjamin’s uncle since he was a boy. Lord Caradoc was involved in government affairs and then connected to a trading company in India. I heard he has made a fortune.”
Amy decided she had just experienced her mother’s one lucid moment for this month between her many flustered spells, although she had a great suspicion that her mother’s flustered spells were not entirely genuine.
“Mother,” asked Amy, “you will invite Sir Benjamin to the picnic?”
“Yes of course dear, whenever I can find Mrs. Parkhurst. I need her help in making out the invitations.”
Amy looked over at Emma, who shrank down in her chair.
“Would you excuse me?” Amy asked her mother. “I will be right back.”
Her mother didn’t seem to notice the question but looked distracted over the matter of the invitations and whom she should invite.
Mrs. Parkhurst had not come to lunch. This was not of itself unusual, but combined with her apparent mysterious disappearance it called for an investigation, so Amy decided to go in search of the missing governess.
The first place she looked was in the room where Emma took her lessons. The room was empty. Amy entered it and looked around. As she was about to leave she thought she heard something, so she stopped and listened. Muffled noises were coming from the cupboard where the school supplies were stored.
She went over to the cupboard and listened.
“Hello,” she asked, “is someone in there?”
The muffled voice from behind the door affirmed that the answer was yes. When Amy went to get the key, which was kept in the desk by the door, it was missing. She went back to the supply cupboard door and told the victim inside that the key was missing but that she was sure she knew where she could find it and she would promptly return and release her from her prison.
Amy went back to the dining room. Her mother seemed to be engaged in thought while occasionally acknowledging Mattie’s effusive comments which seemed to still center around the drooly youth. Her father sat with a bemused expression slowly chewing his food. Emma looked as if she was trying not to be noticed.
“I need you to come with me,” Amy growled to her under her breath.
Lady Sibbridge was still lost in thought. Mattie was still effusing. Lord Sibbridge was still chewing.
“I’m not through eating,” Emma said through clenched teeth.
“Your life depends on you coming with me.”
Emma looked at first as if she was going to resist, and then she reluctantly got up and followed Amy into the hall. Perhaps she thought better of refusing given the look in Amy’s expression that she was about to commit Emmacide.
Once outside Amy held her hand out and demanded: “I want the key.”
“What key?” asked Emma with her very best innocent look.
“All right. Do you want to die right here? Do you want your blood ruining mother’s carpet? Or, do I get the key to the supply cupboard where you have cruelly imprisoned dear Mrs. Parkhurst?”
“But...”
“The key,” demanded Amy cutting off what Emma was about to say.
Emma took the key out of the pocket of her smock.
“All I’m trying to say is that I found the key. That is the only reason I have it in my pocket. I didn’t know Mrs. Parkhurst was in the cupboard.”
“Look at Mr. Gainsborough’s painting of our family. Do you see that beautiful little girl with the blond hair? She looks so innocent. Well, she is older now and bound for perdition.”
“Will you get sent to perdition for locking Mrs. Parkhurst in the cupboard and dissembling just a little bit about it? I mean, it is Mrs. Parkhurst. Isn’t there some kind of an exception or dispensation in the case of Mrs. Parkhurst.”
Emma looked up at her sister with a wondrous expression of innocence and guilelessness. Amy, shaking her head, left on her rescue mission to release the governess from her upstairs dungeon of books and papers.
Chapter 6
The next morning, as they were leaving the dining room after breakfast Amy’s mother suddenly blurted out: “Saturday morning next week.”
Now her mother did have a habit of firing off thoughts without necessarily preparing her listeners.
“I’m sorry mother,” said Amy, “what do you mean by Saturday morning of next week.”
“The picnic, of course, what else would I mean.”
“Of course, Mother. May I take Sir Benjamin’s invitation over to Hillfield House?”
They had paused in the front hall. Just inside the door stood Hubert with a long face.
“It’s not necessary, dear,” said her mother. “I’ve summoned old Hubert and he will deliver it.”
“But Hubert is not feeling well. I’d be glad to take it.”
Amy had no idea how old Hubert felt this morning, but he never really felt well, at least this is the impression he gave. And indeed, as Amy knew, anything that hinted of physical activity made him feel worse. As for Hubert himself, he remained silent. He had no intention of interfering in a conversation between Amy and her mother, especially since he rather favored Amy’s argument on his behalf.
“Hubert, are you ailing this morning?” Lady Sibbridge demanded.
“Don’t feel none too good, Ma’am,” he mumbled with a ‘none too good’ facial expression.
“He might die on the way,” Amy added, and then immediately regretted her comment which seemed too much like overkill, but her mother as usual paid no heed to the excess of her remark. On the other hand, old Hubert didn’t seem to care for her
remark given the grimace on his face. Amy realized his apprehension and apologized.
“Well, I suppose,” her mother replied.
Lady Sibbridge was visibly reluctant. Then Mattie entered the hall from the dining room. Their father was still at the table chewing his breakfast and Amy rather supposed that Mattie had been regaling him, the last survivor at breakfast table, with her infatuation with the drooly youth. Whatever shortcomings their father had nowadays, he was definitely a good listener.
Their mother grabbed Mattie by the arm.
“Take Mattie with you. She will enjoy your trip to Hillfield House.”
That was not Mattie’s opinion.
“Mother,” she wailed, “Mr. Throckmorton, Lazarus’s father, is coming by sometime today. It would not be polite if your daughter was not here to greet him.”
Amy might have marveled at Mattie’s strained logic, but much of Mattie’s logic was strained. Mattie was anxious to remain home in the hope that the drooly youth would accompany his father. Amy was fine with that, but she would have to take someone with her. Her mother would never countenance her going by herself.
“Perhaps Emma could accompany me.”
She quickly excused herself from her mother’s presence before her mother thought it over. Even her mother realized that Emma’s usefulness as a chaperone was in question. In fact, Emma was more likely to be an accomplice.
Amy found Emma in her study room.
“Come with me, Emma. You must go with me to Hillfield House to deliver a picnic invitation to Ben... Sir Benjamin.”
“I thought you wanted me to concentrate on my studies,” said Emma as she quickly turned over the paper she had been examining before Amy could see what was written on it.
“This is an emergency,” Amy told her as she looked suspiciously at the paper Emma was stuffing into the middle of a stack of other papers. How easy it was to fool Mrs. Parkhurst, although in truth the poor governess had never faced an enemy like Emma in her entire and varied career.
The Captain's Daughter Page 4